The Effect of Internal Leakages on Thermal Performance in NPPs

Since the Balance Of Plant (BOP, limited to a turbine cycle in this study) does not contain radioactive material, regulatory authorities did not need to have concerns on it. As the interests on safety and performance is getting more serious and extensive, controlling the level of safety and performance of a BOP have just begun or is about to begin. The performance standards or ageing management programs of the major equipment in a BOP is being developed. The regulatory requirements for tests and/or maintenance are being actively built up. There is also a probabilistic approach quantifying performance of a BOP. The study on quantifying the rate of unanticipated shutdowns caused by careless maintenance and/or tests conducted in a BOP is going on. In this study, the modeling of the entire BOP and the methodologies of thermal performance analysis should be one of the must-have items as well. This study was achieved to ensure fundamental skills related to 1) the detailed steady-state modeling of a BOP and 2) thermal performance analysis under various conditions. Particularly, the paper will focus on the effect of internal leakages inside the valves and FeedWater Heaters (FWHs). The internal leakage is regarded as the flow movement through the isolated path but remaining inside the system boundary of a BOP. For instance, the leakage from one side of a valve seat to the other side, or the leakage through the cracked tubes or tube-sheets in a heat exchanger correspond to internal leakages. We made a BOP model of OPR1000 and investigated thermal performance under the internal leakage in Turbine Bypass Condenser Dump Valves (TBCDV) and FWHs